~ Beyond bones & stones

Bili Apes: The Giant Lion-Eating Chimps Of The Magic Forest

Nothing like a good lurid headline on which to end the day, and to give us with an apt example, the Guardian has conjured up this gem to furnish their report on the mysterious Bili apes. For many years the stuff of legend, the apes, named for the local area, were eventually observed in the flesh, in once instance chomping away on the carcass of a leopard. This, if true, is surprising enough, but not as odd as the idea that it may even have killed its feline prey, a behaviour never before reported in apes, but corresponds to rumour that has persisted locally for some time. There doesn’t appear to be any explanation of how this killing of a leopard by one or more apes might have been accomplished, or whether or not they could have made and/or used weapons, such as rocks, or trapped it in some fiendish device. The Bili or Bondo Mystery Apes are to be found in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and are described thus in Wikipedia…

The Bili Ape is massive by chimpanzee standards. Heights can exceed 5 feet (about Gorilla height), their skulls are larger than chimp skulls, and their footprints are larger even than gorillas. Unfortunately, there have been relatively few detailed observations of the Bili Ape and no thorough examination of either remains or a living Bili Ape in captivity. They are also various(ly) described as having silver backs and even snouted faces (uncommon).

The locals in Bili refer to Bili Apes as “Lion Killers”. While chimps tend to stay in the trees and make good prey for big cats, Bili Apes nest on the ground like gorillas and have been reported to hunt lions.

Until recently, very little has been heard of these apes, as apparently they were only reported in the West as late as 1996, and the Wikipedia article claims Jane Goodall was able to send in an expedition to find them in 2004, at a time when there must have been a lull in the local warfare that has plagued the region for years. However, when I ran a quick search at Jane Goodall’s website, nothing came up for ‘Bili’ or ‘Bondo’, so I can’t as yet confirm her involvement in the discovery. This from the Guardian…

The most detailed and recent data comes from Cleve Hicks, at the University of Amsterdam, who has spent 18 months in the field watching the Bili apes – named after a local town – since 2004. His team’s most striking find came after one of his trackers heard chimps calling for several days from the same spot.

When he investigated he came across a chimp feasting on the carcass of a leopard. Mr Hicks cannot be sure the animal was killed by the chimp, but the find lends credence to the apes’ lion-eating reputation.

“What we have found is this completely new chimpanzee culture,” said Mr Hicks. Previously, researchers had only managed to snatch glimpses of the animals or take photos of them using camera traps. But Mr Hicks used local knowledge to get closer to them and photograph them.

“We were told of this sort of fabled land out west by one of our trackers who goes out there to fish,” said Mr Hicks whose project is supported by the Wasmoeth Wildlife Foundation. “I call it the magic forest. It is a very special place.”

I daresay that a fair amount of scepticism will greet this news, at least until further corroborative observations have been made, but if it’s confirmed that these apes really do behave in the manner described, it will be interesting to see whether there is a debate as to whether they should become classified as Pan or Homo. In the meantime, here’s a good link which reports on Cleve Hicks’ field studies back in 2004

Apes at night are generally to be found sleeping in nests which are built in the branches of trees as a precaution against being attacked on the ground in the night by anything with harmfully large teeth and sharp claws, but many of the Bili apes appear to prefer ground level dormitory accommodation…

Mr Hicks reports that he found a unique chimp culture. For example, unlike their cousins in other parts of Africa the chimps regularly bed down for the night in nests on the ground. Around a fifth of the nests he found were there rather than in the trees.

“How can they get away with sleeping on the ground when there are lions, leopards, golden cats around as well as other dangerous animals like elephants and buffalo?” said Mr Hicks.

“The ground nests were very big and there was obviously something very unusual going on there. They are not unknown elsewhere but very unusual,” said Colin Groves, an expert on primate morphology at the Australian National University in Canberra who has observed the nests in the field.

And most surprising of all, was the revelation that there seem to be plentiful numbers of these apes in the surrounding countryside, especially as we often hear how many other apes and other fauna in the area are falling victim to poachers, hunters and trigger-happy others. (TJ)

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About Tim Jones

I have a generalised interest in areas of research and discovery related to palaeoanthropology, archaeology and so forth. As a layman in all matters scientific, I like to cover and comment upon current and salient topics, hence this blog.
I also occasionally submit content to Anthropology.net

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14 thoughts on “Bili Apes: The Giant Lion-Eating Chimps Of The Magic Forest”

As told to me by native from the magic forest who in now living in the United States and applying for citizenship status.

Human poachers in that area have realized that some of their fellow poachers were found without a limb or two and in some cases eaten down to their bones. Poachers are staying away from the Bili Apes. They are afraid of them and should be. The poacher that I met said he would never go back to the magic forest again. It was indeed terrifying. As I watched him tell me his story, he hardly blinked an eye and he appeared to be frighten as he described in details what happen to his fellow poachers. These apes have the ability to think ahead and plan an attack against humans. And even hold a human prisoner and eat on him for a few days before finally killing him or because of the pain and horror of their experience, the human dies. Just horrible.
My feelings on it:
Looks like poachers are getting their just reward.

Why does everyone post some wacky dazed out comment on this site? Seriously, I’m not denying what you wrote, Mark — I believe non-human primates, especially great apes, to be intelligent animals but magic forest?

It is obvious that the author of this article did not research his facts very deeply before publishing. Had he done so, he would have noted that apes (Chimpanzees) organize and conduct hunting expeditions. (Jane Goodall in several of her papers and books). to characterize eating meat or hunting without tools as a rare incident is tantamount to re-introducing the anthropological mythologies that Goodall shattered decades ago. That a Bili-Ape may exist is no surprise. That we have yet to bring back samples (alive or otherwise) remains, to me, a mystery.

Michael Crichton was not stupid. He was aware of secretive things going on and wrote his books as fiction format so he wont get peer gang banged as crazy etc.
He knew about the Congo killer apes.
Leopards have been killed by gangs of baboons.
A large Congo ape would make short work of a leopard if it had numbers on it side.
Apes are extremely intelligent. Infact most animals are not stupid as scientists thought in the past.

a good question would be is if there were reports of the bili ape before they were found where does that leave other animals that are reported but not yet found by the modern world. In particular ,because this is interesting to me, Mokele mbembe of the congo!???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????!!!!!!

Mokele mbembe really? Its wacked crap such as this that makes cryptozoologist look like idiots. Serious thought should be given to our ape cousins present and past. Arguements concerning the lack of evidence about mystery apes should not come as a suprise. Our cousins are intelligent enough to stay out of harms way, remaining undetected is an effective survival stratedgy given our tendency kill them. And what if the bili ape is shown to be closer to us genetically? Will we then start usiing this wonderfull example of how much we don’t know for testing new drugs? Better that they had not been discovered then to be exploited and destroyed. read but not spell checked, Dave da Rave

He nevertheless makes a good and valid point that many hitherto “undiscovered” animals have been known to indigneous people long before one is seen and described by western scientists/researchers. There have been many cases in recent years, mostly in Laos/Vietnam and other SE Asian locations. Not all cryptozoologists are off in pixieland.